Congressional Republicans are using the power of the purse to do battle against a series of controversial labor regulations from the Obama administration. They say the National Labor Relations Board (NRLB) gave a gift to labor unions by issuing what they call an “ambush election” rule that speeds up the process for organizing in the workplace. Republican lawmakers are also incensed by a joint-employer policy that holds companies responsible for the labor violations of their business partners, and by a “micro-union” policy that paves the way for multiple labor unions to organize in a single workplace. Now tasked with crafting...

What if you won an election butt the incumbent refused to leave?I know, silly isn’t it? However that’s exactly what happened in Alabama. Employees of an Alabama plant will be voting for the fifth time on whether it will oust the United Auto Workers union. The union has lost three of the four previous votes at NTN-Bower Corporation, but has filed appeals with the National Labor Relations Board alleging management interference.The one vote won by the union was nullified for voting irregularities. In that January vote, only 139 of the plant's 140 workers voted, but a total of 148 ballots...

House Speaker John A. Boehner criticized Obama's decision. "The NLRB's ambush election rule is an assault on the rights and privacy protections of American workers," Boehner said. "With his veto, the president has once again put the interests of his political allies ahead of the small-business owners and hardworking Americans who create jobs and build a stronger economy." The rule was a victory for unions, which have long complained that the process is too long. AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka, using language similar to Obama, has said that the board's "modest but important reforms" will help reduce delays and make it...

The federal government has said in a major, closely watched lawsuit that McDonald's Corp. violated workers' union rights at its individual franchise restaurants. What officials haven't said is exactly how the corporation did this since it didn't actually employ the workers, the franchise owners did. To win the case, the government will have to prove that McDonald's is a "joint employer" of the workers with the franchises — a concept that runs counter to very understanding of what a franchise is: a legally separate entity that merely rents out the parent corporation's trademarks. The actual charging documents by National Labor...

President Obama's National Labor Relations Board will consider a case this week with important implications for the future of the franchise industry. Last year, NLRB's lead attorney found that McDonald's corporation should be treated as a "joint employer," meaning that it be responsible for the business and labor practices at each and every one of its franchise operations. This week, an administrative law judge will determine the viability of that finding. If he confirms it, McDonald's could face numerous suits and actions from the NLRB....

Richard Griffin was appointed to the National Labor Relations Board via a recess appointment and still serves despite a court ruling that his appointment was illegal. House Republicans on Thursday struck down a labor board rule which critics say unfairly benefit unions.The National Labor Relations Board rule, which was finalized in December, shortens the length of time in which a labor union certification election is held from the current median of 38 days to as little as 11 days.Calling it the “ambush election” rule, critics argue it will deprive employees time to fully understand the impact of unionizing before they...

The federal government is stepping into the void of decades of inattentiveness to religious identity at several Catholic colleges. The chapel at St. Mary's College of California in Moraga is seen in a 2009 photo. (CNS photo/courtesy St. Mary's College of California) While many Catholics have been concerned for decades about professors at Catholic colleges denying core Church teachings on theological issues, as well as about disputes over womenâ€™s ordination, same-sex marriage, and abortion on Catholic campuses, few Catholic college leaders have been willing to enforce the requirements of Ex Corde Ecclesiae, which mandates that Catholic college faculty teach in...

Congressional Republicans launched a drive Monday to repeal a recent National Labor Relations Board rule updating procedures for union representation elections, setting up a likely veto showdown with President Barack Obama. Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., said the GOP will employ a little-used law that permits the Senate to reject some federal agency regulations by majority vote and denies opponents the ability to thwart action through a filibuster. Alexander said that by shortening the time between a union’s request for representation and the actual balloting, the NLRB had cleared the way for a new type of “ambush election” to take place...

Anti-union forces claim UAW ‘stuffed’ ballot box. Workers in Alabama are staging a fourth attempt to kick the United Auto Workers (UAW) out of their plant following claims that stuffed ballot boxes derailed their last vote. Employees at the NTN-Bower Corporation, a ball bearings manufacturer, have unsuccessfully tried to boot the labor giant out of their factory for two years. Workers voted to decertify the UAW in an earlier election, but an Obama-appointed National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) panel threw out the election. Another election was held in January of this year. The UAW prevailed, but it was later revealed...

The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) is facing a second lawsuit from business groups upset about a controversial rule they contend will unfairly speed up union elections. The business groups are challenging what they refer to as the NLRB's "ambush election" rule. The Texas chapters of the Associated Builders and Contractors (ABC) and National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) filed the lawsuit late Tuesday in federal court seeking to overturn the rule. "We are proud to join the legal fight against the ambush rule, which is designed to deprive employers, particularly small businesses who typically do not employ legal counsel,...

The National Labor Relations Board is expected in the coming weeks to weigh in on several high-profile labor cases with major implications on workforce and union issues, ranging from college football players to fast food restaurants. Business are bracing for a flurry of action from a labor board they’ve accused of taking on an activist, pro-union agenda. "We’ve seen the board become very active and aggressive under the Obama administration,” said Beth Milito, senior executive counsel for the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB). One of the most closely watched cases on the labor board’s agenda involves a bid by...

In The Trial, written a century ago in 1914, Franz Kafka paints a portrait of an unimaginably oppressive government with secret laws and trials in which the individual is crushed. Today, in 2014, Kafka would not have to invent these circumstances. He could find them in real life, at the National Labor Relations Board. It’s up to the 114th Congress to keep the NLRB in check.On Friday, just before the holidays, NLRB General Counsel Richard Griffin announced that he had issued complaints against McDonald’s franchised restaurants and McDonald’s USA, the parent corporation, as joint employers. Workers complained that they...

McDonald’s and its franchisees illegally retaliated against employees for participating in union-related activities, the National Labor Relations Board’s top lawyer alleged Friday in a case with sweeping industry implications. NLRB general counsel Richard Griffin announced Friday he will issue 13 complaints involving 78 charges against franchises and McDonald’s USA, LLC. Though many of these alleged labor violations were committed by independent franchise owners, Griffin ruled earlier this year that McDonald’s can be held liable for those actions as a so-called joint employer, leaving the corporatrion — and potentially other franchisors — exposed to such claims. McDonald’s said the decision will...

The National Labor Relations Board issued a final rule on Friday aimed at modernizing and streamlining the union election process. The new rule will shorten the time between when an election is ordered and the election is held, eliminating a previous 25-day waiting period. And it seeks to reduce litigation that can be used to stall elections. It will also require employers to furnish union organizers with email addresses and phone numbers of workers. […] AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said the NLRB’s “modest but important reforms” will help reduce delays and make it easier for workers to vote on forming...

Dawn Lafreeda began working at Denny’s when she was 16, making her way up from hostess to waitress. In 1984, at the age of 23, she bought her first store. She now owns over 70. “When I was a kid, I told myself that I was going to be self-employed when I grew up and have a better life and have the things I’d never had,” she told Entrepreneur magazine this past summer. Franchising was Dawn’s ticket to a better life. She’s not alone. Franchising has been a successful business model for Americans wanting to own their own businesses and...

If the Obama Administration has its way, Ronald McDonald may soon have to wipe that grin off his face as he stands beneath the Golden Arches. One of the most successful models for expanding small-business ownership in America is under full-scale attack from unions and the White House. The political strategy is to fundamentally change the legal relationship between locally owned stores like McDonald's (NYSE:MCD), Popeyes (NASDAQ:PLKI), Taco Bell (NYSE:YUM) and their multibillion-dollar parent companies. No longer would franchisees be legally classified as independent contractors to the parent company. The left wants the employees of each of the hundreds of...

Labor Day provides the opportunity to evaluate those government agencies that impact the workplace, and gauge if they are helping or hurting the employment situation in America. In the six Labor Days since President Obama took office, his appointees have gone to outrageous lengths to compel the 93 percent of the private-sector workforce who don't belong to an organized labor union to become dues-paying members. While the Labor Department and the National Mediation Board have each pushed hard to create rules that overwhelmingly favor union organizers over those employees who oppose unionization, it is the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB)...

The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) made a very strange decision last week to rule that McDonald's MCD -0.23% the corporation, was a joint employer of the staff in the franchised restaurants. It was, of course, at the urging of those labour activists who would like to union organise in the sector. Dealing with one national company is obviously going to be easier than dealing with thousands of independent business owners. There’s a number of problems with this decision ranging from the way that it overturns what has long thought to be settled law, to it obviating already signed contracts...

Would you like to own a small business someday? If so, sorry — the Service Employees International Union would rather you didn’t. SEIU has convinced the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to eviscerate the franchising model that many small-business owners rely on. Under the current model, these small-business owners pay for the right to use a corporate brand. The franchising corporation researches appealing products. It also does marketing to promote the brand. In return, the local franchisees agree to produce those products to fit certain price and quality specifications. The local franchisee handles all the hiring and employment. This division...

Another day, another radical move from the Obama administration. In a big win for the more opportunistic corners of the organized-labor movement, the National Labor Relations Board decided this week that, in a range of labor cases involving McDonald’s, it will consider the corporate parents of franchise businesses liable for the labor agreements reached between franchises and their employees. The NLRB has maintained otherwise for 30 years, refusing to consider corporations with franchises to be part of a “joint employer” arrangement. Why decide that corporations are employers of employees whom they don’t hire, don’t pay, and can’t fire? Because the...

Once again, one man has dictated a major change of federal law that can cost American families dearly. It may double the price of your Big Mac, Whopper, fried chicken, donuts or other purchases at your local fast-food restaurant. Where’s the beef coming from? Surprise! This time it’s neither President Obama nor Attorney General Eric Holder who is twisting the law like a pretzel from Auntie Anne’s. It’s Obama appointee Richard Griffin, the president’s hand-picked choice for the all-powerful position as general counsel of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). Mr. Griffin has declared that millions of Americans who work...

resident Obama’s National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has showed itself once again to be a strident advocate for the interests of Big Labor bosses, ready to stand up for union interests even in the face of common sense. This week, the NLRB ruled that cosmetics workers at a Macy’s store in Saugus, Massachusetts, were allowed to form a collective bargaining unit for their department alone – what’s known as a “micro-union.” Of course, the three-to-one decision was split along strictly partisan lines. The three Democrats on the Board sided with the United Food & Commercial Workers Union (UFCW), representing the...

The efforts of Northwestern University’s scholarship football players to unionize could have profound implications for the future of college education. northwestern university football According to the Associated Press, Northwestern University just filed a 60-page brief with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) in Washington, D.C. This comes after a regional director of the NLRB ruled this past spring that “football players who receive full scholarships to the Big Ten school qualify as employees under federal law and therefore can unionize.” If the decision of the regional director is upheld, the framework between the players and the university would be redefined...

If you paid close attention this week, you could see the sand shifting under Obama’s feet. From public opinion to the federal courts to the president’s former putative allies, it was not a good week to be Obama, and it’s likely to get worse for him. Walkabouts in D.C., travels to distant fundraisers, preposterous flailing on the international scene, and more shots with his cute kids are not going to change the situation as far as I can tell. Yet he lacks other options. 1. Hard Drives are Crashing all over the Place This week, the efforts to push the...

Thursday’s Supreme Court ruling that President Obama’s “recess” appointments to the National Labor Relations Board were unconstitutional could mean as many as 800 cases decided by the illegal appointees would have to be reconsidered. The Court ruled three appointments President Obama made on Jan. 4, 2012, to fill out the five-member National Labor Relations Board, were improper because the Senate was not, in fact, in recess. That means the NLRB did not have a quorum, as required by law, when it ruled on hundreds of cases from the time they were appointed until August 2013, when other nominees were properly...

Back in 2011, Sens. David Vitter, R-La, and Jim DeMint, R-S.C. organized a letter from 20 GOP senators urging House Speaker John Boehner to block any resolution allowing the Senate to recess for more than three days. Vitter was upfront about his rationale. He wanted to block Democratic President Barack Obama from making recess appointments when the Senate was recessed. And Thursday, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously, in effect, that the strategy outlined by Vitter and DeMint was valid -- that the Senate really wasn't in recess when the president used his recess appointment authority to name three members to...

The Supreme Court ruling on Thursday that invalidated three appointments made by President Obama to the National Labor Relations Board has thrown hundreds of the board's decisions into question. The board that rules on labor disputes is now scrambling to determine the impact of the high court decision. At issue is whether board decisions made when the now-invalid appointees were participating will have to be re-decided under the current NLRB.

Three cheers for right-wing obstructionism. Can we have more, please, and louder? This week's unanimous Supreme Court ruling on President Obama's illegal recess appointments is a double smackdown. First, it's a rebuke against arrogant White House power-grabbers who thought they could act with absolute impunity and interminable immunity. Second, the ruling is a reproach of all the establishment pushovers on Capitol Hill who put comity above constitutional principle. In a nutshell: The high court determined that Obama lawlessly exceeded his executive authority when he foisted three members onto the National Labor Relations Board in 2012, during what Democrats declared was...

Two and one-half years ago in 2012, Obama tried to slip-in appointments to the National Labor Relations Board without the constitutionally required Senate approval, claiming he had the right to do so because the Senate was in recess. There’s only one problem. The Senate was not in formal recess when Obama made the dictatorial appointments. Now the Supreme Court of the United States has ruled in a unanimous 9-0 decision that Obama doesn’t get to define when the U.S. Senate is in recess, the Senate does. This is the first time in U.S. history that the Constitution’s recess appointment clause...

The US Supreme Court today limited a president's power to make recess appointments when the White House and the Senate are controlled by opposite parties, scaling back a presidential authority as old as the republic.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Supreme Court has limited a president's power to make temporary appointments to fill high-level government jobs. The court said Thursday that President Barack Obama exceeded his authority when he invoked the Constitution's provision on recess appointments to fill slots on the National Labor Relations Board in 2012.

Starbucks cannot fire a union activist employee who cursed at a manager in front of customers, the National Labor Relations Board has ruled for the second time. Joseph Agins was active in trying to unionize four Manhattan Starbucks coffee shops between 2004 and 2007. According to the NLRB ruling, he twice cursed during arguments with managers. The first time, on May 14, 2005, Agins was angry that an assistant manager did not come to help him right away when the shop got busy. When the manager did come to help, Agins said it was "about damn time," noisily shoved a...

(Reuters) - The United Auto Workers, surprising even its supporters, on Monday abruptly withdrew its legal challenge to a union organizing vote that it lost at a Volkswagen AG plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee in February. Just an hour before the start of a National Labor Relations Board hearing on the challenge, the union dropped its case, casting a cloud over its long and still unsuccessful push to organize foreign-owned auto plants in the U.S. South.VW workers due to testify in the NLRB hearing were already at the courthouse in downtown Chattanooga when they heard the news, which left lawyers in...

CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. — The UAW announced today it is withdrawing objections filed with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) regarding February's vote at the Volkswagen plant in Chattanooga, effectively terminating the NLRB review process. UAW President Bob King said the decision was made in the best interests of Volkswagen employees, the automaker, and economic development in Chattanooga. King said the UAW based its decision on the belief that the NLRB’s historically dysfunctional and complex process potentially could drag on for months or even years. Additionally, the UAW cited refusals by Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam and U.S. Sen. Bob Corker to...

CHATTANOOGA (Reuters) -- The UAW said today it is withdrawing its objection claiming undue outside political interference in a February vote it lost among workers at the Volkswagen AG plant in Tennessee. UAW President Bob King, in a statement issued by the union this morning, said the process of objecting to the National Labor Relations Board could have dragged on for months if not years. King and the UAW announced the withdrawal on the morning of the scheduled start of an NLRB hearing in Chattanooga on the union's objection.

Thus marks the end of the United Auto Workers’ foray into unionizing Southern auto manufacturing. Despite cooperative management at Volkswagen, the UAW failed to convince workers in its Chattanooga facility to unionize. The union alleged interference and demanded a hearing at the National Labor Relations Board to force a revote, but unexpectedly withdrew just before the hearing was scheduled to start:

The United Auto Workers announced Monday it is withdrawing an appeal of the outcome of a union vote at Volkswagen’s assembly plant in Tennessee. In a statement released one hour before the scheduled start of a National Labor Relations Board hearing in Chattanooga, Tenn., UAW President Bob King said the union decided to put the “tainted election in the rearview mirror” because the challenge could have taken months or even years to come to a conclusion. …

One for the hypocrisy hall of fame: Media Matters for America is apparently resisting an effort by Service Employees International Union Local 500 to unionize its staff.Last week, the union filed a representation petition with the National Labor Relations Board, indicating that the nonprofit media watchdog organization rejected an effort by the union to organize MMFAâ€™s staff through a Card Check election.A filing with the NLRB does not necessarily mean that the union and management are in direct confrontation. For example, although Volkswagen tacitly backed the United Auto Workersâ€™ recent effort to organize its Chattanooga, Tenn., plant, the company still...

Senator Graham aggressively fought President Obama's union appointees at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) when they filed a frivolous complaint against Boeing's decision to build a production facility in South Carolina. The labor unions were so upset about Lindsey's efforts they retaliated by filing a baseless ethics charge. Lindsey's response: "I will not be intimidated." He refused to back down, the ethics charge was dismissed, and Boeing prevailed - saving thousands of South Carolina jobs. Lindsey has introduced legislation to restrict the NLRB's authority and prohibit the NLRB from having a say in where American companies can do business....

Get your popcorn… The SEIU is petitioning the National Labor Relations Board to unionize the employees the employees at Media Matters. In response, Media Matters has hired a high priced law firm to represent the company. And, here we thought they supported unions? Weird, huh?

Racketeering, assault, and extortion -- these are just a few of the crimes that union organizers have been accused or convicted of committing over the past few weeks and months. You would think Big Labor bosses would be concerned with their image and whether or not it affects their ability to maneuver with friends in the Obama Administration. Not so. In fact, they have been emboldened by the actions undertaken by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), which is currently seeking to expedite the unionization process so much so that workers and businesses will not be able to make informed...

National Labor Relations Board members ruled Monday that NBC Universal, the parent company of the namesake TV network and the cable news channel MSNBC, was illegally refusing to deal with its employees' union, the National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians. It ordered the company to "cease and desist" avoiding the union. "[T]he Respondent has been failing and refusing to bargain collectively and in good faith with the exclusive collective-bargaining representative of its unit employees and has engaged in unfair labor practices," ruled a three-member NLRB majority. The announcement is ironic given that MSNBC has remade itself as a liberal...

This could well be the most outrageous insult yet to the free market economy: In what may be the strongest signal yet of the new pro-labor orientation of the National Labor Relations Board under President Obama, the agency filed a complaint Wednesday seeking to force Boeing to bring an airplane production line back to its unionized facilities in Washington State instead of moving the work to a nonunion plant in South Carolina. Do I need to explain how many kinds of wrong this is? Not only is the federal government saying to Boeing that it gets to decide where it...

SEIU and other labor unions can accompany the government inspectors on site visits due to a quiet and contested Obama administration rule clarification issued last year in response to a request from a union representative. Maurice Baskin, an attorney representing the Associated Builders and Contractors and the National Association of Manufacturers, said in testimony before the House Subcommittee on Workforce Protections that OSHA’s clarification letter violates the OSH Act and the National Labor Relations Act. Section 9 of the National Labor Relations Act holds that an “authorized representative” must be an agent from a union that a majority of the...

When the UAW failed miserably in Chattanooga and was not able to unionize the Volkswagen plant, even with a staked deck, it started a chain reaction and the next domino has fallen. The news that the AFL-CIO has decided to keep its money and not even try to save three Southern Democrat Senators comes as no real shock. The powerful union reviewed the polls and the political climate in North Carolina, Louisiana and Arkansas and decided backing the Democrats in these states would be throwing good money after bad. The decision left Democrat Senators Mark Pryor in Arkansas, Mary Landrieu...

The United Auto Workers (UAW) filed a legal challenge late Friday with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to the certification of the organizing vote it lost last Friday at Volkswagen's auto plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee. The challenge was submitted just hours before the seven day post-election filing deadline expired. On Tuesday, attorney Joseph Farelli, a nationally recognized labor law expert, told Breitbart News the UAW would have little chance of success if it filed a challenge to NLRB certification of the election. "I don't think the NLRB is willing to break new ground and state the conduct of a...

The United Auto Workers said on Friday it filed an appeal with the government over "interference by politicians and outside special interest groups" in an election last week in Tennessee where Volkswagen workers rejected the union. The union said in a statement that its appeal to the U.S. National Labor Relations Board details "a coordinated and widely publicized coercive campaign conducted by politicians and outside organizations to deprive Volkswagen workers of their federally protected right to join a union."

Supreme Court justices took a dim view Monday of President Obama’s claim of almost unlimited powers to appoint top government officials, saying he appeared to be breaking with the founders’ vision of separation of powers between the branches of government when he tried an end-run around the Senate in 2012. Both liberal and conservative justices seemed skeptical of the president’s claim, though they struggled with how far to go in deciding the limits of a president’s recess appointment power. If they ruled narrowly, they could simply overturn Mr. Obama’s 2012 appointments by finding he tried to act when the Senate...

Nothing less than the boundaries of executive power are at stake Monday as the Supreme Court considers whether President Obama violated the Constitution during his first term. Oral arguments slated for Monday will center on a trio of recess appointments to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) that were deemed unconstitutional by lower courts. If they uphold the decision, experts say the justices could endanger hundreds of NLRB decisions. Even more significant are the ramifications for future presidents, with the court poised either to bolster or blunt the chief executive’s appointment powers. “Rulings like this have implications that last for...

In the coming days, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in the case of Noel Canning versus the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). This case arose when President Obama made several so-called recess appointments to the Board on January 4, 2012 when the Senate was not formally in recess. This landmark case is expected to determine how much leeway the President has to make appointments without Senate confirmation, and more significantly, it will have serious implications on the broader powers of the presidency itself and the system of checks and balances. The United States Court of Appeals for...